The Road goes ever on and on,Down from the door where it began.Now far ahead the Road has gone,And I must follow if I can,Pursuing it with eager feet,Until it joins some larger way,Where many paths and errands meet.And whither then? I cannot say.

Pittsburgh is the city of bridges, where the Allegheny and the Monongahela come together to make the Ohio (and I cannot believe I spelled those both right on the first try).

And.

Well, I'm back, like the man said.

Much to my surprise, I started grinning hard when I saw the skyline, and I didn't stop until we were out of sight of the city (trying to find our hotel).

And having reached my destination, I'll probably never use this tag again, which is said, but . . . the journey's over. Or really, the first leg of the journey, I should say. There's plenty of journeying to be had, and sooner than I think.

*curious* Does anyone know anything about ING Direct? My sister and her boy were enthusing about it -- they said it's an online bank with savings account interest of 4.5%. Which sounds a little too good to be true, to me, but my sister is usually pretty well-informed about this kind of thing . . .

*yawn* Today, hopefully, I get to hang at a bookstore finally. Oh, and figure out textbooks, since I finally found out what I need. Tomorrow is an unexpected return trip to Chicago!

The last two nights in Buchanan have been cool -- cold, in fact -- so I have high hopes for Pittsburgh being a reasonable temperature at night. (I can deal with it being hot during the day fine. After all, I can always go someplace with AC and hang out there. But at night, with no AC in the dorms? *shudder* Talk about misery.)

We drove from Wheaton to Buchanan today, which means we went through three states. We also went by a 40-ft RV that was just catching on fire, and a trucker who'd stopped his truck and was running for the scene with a fire extinguisher. Apparently we timed it just exactly right -- my aunt and uncle were driving the opposite way a little while later and called to say that the road was totally blocked by police cars and fire trucks and so forth. Oh, and when we pulled into the driveway here, we discovered that one of our tires was going flat.

So. Exciting!

So now we're in Buchanan, just like every August. Except that it's entirely, entirely different.

Mom got here yesterday so that she and her siblings could work more on estate issues. I walked in today, and I noticed the moving-out-like chaos of boxes and items and so forth, sure. Hard not to notice.

And then I went into the bathroom and closed the door, and there was a big, blank rectangle where there used to be a poster of Mary Cassatt's The Bath. Just . . . nothing. Just the remnants of tape or glue or whatever had been used to put that poster up who knows how many years ago.

That's when it finally sank in that everything is changing, elementally, at its very core. Buchanan has been a constant -- we stay in the house with the long blacktopped driveway, with the huge maple in the yard, with the porch swing, with the old piano with the out of tune B-flat, and we go to Lake Michigan and we go to Marzita's, only now it's Lucy's, only now it may not even be that anymore soon, and the family drives us crazy but the majority of it is worth the crazy-making.

Who knows what'll happen to the house now, though? Even if the sibs decide to keep it, it'll be empty of all this detritus, all these things that have built up over sixty years of continued occupancy, all this stuff that makes the house what it is. And if they don't decide to keep it, what happens to the family meet-ups? If you take out the core of something, it can still stand, but will it?

To top it all off, of course, there's the still-unsettling fact that when we leave here, I won't go home. I'll go to college. The entirety of my routine has been thrown into confusion.

But some things don't change, because our family has a lot invested in tradition. There's a right way to do things, and a wrong way, and then there's the White way. Which is why now, we're going to go to Warren Dunes on Lake Michigan, by God, and tonight we're going to eat sweet corn at my uncle's, and let nothing stand in our way.

I was planning to rebuild my OS today, as that seems to be the only sure way to fix my computer. Then I realized, all of a sudden, that I have pictures on here from Antigone, from my last day at ATY, more or less my last day in Anchorage.

Including, I am not ashamed to admit, a picture of me and my crush, that, as you might imagine, would be unpleasant to lose.

But whatever the problem is with my computer, it affects Windows Explorer, which is how you access things like programs. And pictures. Which means there's no way for me to move the pictures from my computer to my external hard drive.

I can, however, connect to the Internet and upload my photos to Photobucket.

*collapses in a heap of relief*

Actually, I think Windows finally diagnosed the problem upon being connected to the internet, and sent a problem report to home base, wherever that may be. And since then, it hasn't been freaking out on me.

Well, regardless, I am rebuilding in a minute here. *eyes computer* It's still not behaving entirely as it should, and I would like it to be behaving come the first day of classes.

We stopped by the used bookstore this morning on our way out of Ottumwa and I bought Dark Mirror. >.> No one had touched it since I put it on the shelf yesterday -- the dust jacket was still holding my place. :D And now I'm almost done, and I've gotta say: I feel so much less guilty about all the shit I've put Nita through. *eying mirror!Troi and mirror!Wesley* I mean, geeze.

Am now in Ottumwa, IA. jothra, I am nearly done with that birthday fic I promised you.

There are intimations of thunder in the distance, I think. (I'm probably misusing that word horribly.) ETA: Never mind, that's real thunder. ...And a tornado watch. FUN TIMES.

I finished Crown of Swords (*hums "Another One Bites the Dust", doubtfully*) which means I have no more WoT books with me. HORRORS. I'm afraid that if I don't keep reading, I'll lose all my momentum and interest in the series. Which would make me sad, because I'm still enjoying it, somewhat to my surprise.

To make up for it, though, I'm rereading Pamela Dean's Tam Lin, and man, it's making me feel much, much better about this whole college thing. I've been going through a lot of "Crap crap crap living on my own and making decisions and being responsible and OMG" emotional turmoil, and following Janet through her freshman year is amazingly comforting. Even considering the ominous Melinda Wolfe and Professor Medeous.

Of course, recognizing reference after literary reference makes for fun, distracting reading anyway. And why on EARTH did I not pack any of my Narnia books? What was I thinking?

I'm too sleepy to add anything else of note. Oh! Except! We saw a garage band playing on the street last night -- real small town America type scene. The bass line was great, the rest of it left me ambivalent. mmmmmmelectricbassguitar.

So! Today is our last day in Oklahoma City. Dad and I are twiddling our thumbs in the hotel room until 12, when we have to check out.

Dinner at the Cowboy Museum was a lot of fun, actually -- good vegetarian food (which blows my mind) -- and an AMAZING classical guitarist by the name of Edgar Cruz. He was playing this great mix of Spanish songs, classical music (there was a medley of Greensleeves, Fur Elise, Moonlight Sonata, and Pachebel that I just loved) and pop music.

Including, at the end, and accompanied by me and the rather drunk table behind me, Bohemian Rhapsody.

The Cowboy Museum itself was interesting, although I've never been much of one for museums. It's all, as my dad pointed out, highly romanticized, but a lot of it is gorgeous. Mom was gushing particularly over the Remingtons, and I have to agree; there were several oils painted entirely in grayscale, like a black-and-white photo of a painting. Wish I'd gone into the gun section; Dad said their collection of Colts was pretty impressive.

Go see the Simpsons Movie. Yes. Do it. OMG. My dad and I were laughing so hard at the Alaska jokes; I felt sorry for the people in front of us. We were glad we saw it in Oklahoma (although I understand seeing it with an Alaskan audience is pretty fantastic, too). But it has more to recommend it than Alaska jokes! It's. It's just. If you like the Simpsons, GO SEE IT. You will not be disappointed.

When we weren't in the movie theater, Dad and I wandered around Oklahoma City trying to find a retail store that had post-its (We could barely find retail; we eventually found post-its in a different hotel's gift shop) and complaining about the heat. Good Lord, the heat.

We also ended up wandering by the Oklahoma City Bombing Monument, which was quite nice. What got me, though, was that in the midst of this lovely, austere memorial to one crazy guy and the death he caused . . . all of us tourists ended up gathered around a duck and her ducklings.

Life marches on, and joy is harder to extinguish than some people think.

Tonight, we dine at the Cowboy Museum with the rest of Mum's conference. We have little "Vegetarian" tags, for ease of identification and studying -- I mean, serving.

Today we go more or less straight south to Oklahoma City. (When we head to Kansas City in a few days, we miss Lawrence by a bare 40 miles. Helas.)

So I forgot to mention! As silveraspen's party, I was giving my 30-seconds-or-less definition of dramaturgy: "It's playwrighting, and textual analysis, and historical research, all the geeky stuff." One of the other guests exclaimed "She can say 'textual analysis' and she's not even an undergrad yet!"

And I was Discreetly Smug.

But last night I realized I TOTALLY should've said "Blame Aspen and Viv and their ilk*! Milliways has ruined me." 'Cause it's true.

(I mean, I missed a chance to use "ilk" in a sentence! What's wrong with me?)

*Sweeney, Shati, Mir, you're getting especially Significant Looks, but ALL of you are getting eyed.

We're in a perfectly lovely '50s style motel in Salina, KA (is it KA or KS?), made especially lovely by its AC. *luxuriates* Salina seems like a typical small town -- although the guy holding a cross on the "Welcome to Salina!" sign at the edge of town was worth a double-take.

As for driving through Kansas . . . madbonnycaptain? I hope you won't take it as an insult to your home state that I slept through most of it, when I wasn't actually driving. When I was driving, though, I was moderately freaked out. Kansas is flat, and the freeway is straight, and you'd think it would be an easy drive -- but because it's so flat, there's nothing to cut down on the wind. And while that might not be a problem in a regular car? In a 19-foot-long, 8'4"-high RV, those winds get scary.

. . . You know, I swear I didn't sit down to write an essay that long. I was just gonna babble about dream casting and "ALAN CUMMING AS PADAN FAIN Y/N?!" and stuff.

ETA: Speaking of dream casting -- a quick Google reveals this list. Some of the choices make me nod approvingly; most of the Aiel casting choices make me blink. Coloring, people! It's important! [/snark]

Had a really wonderful time at silveraspen's place, with vivien529 and a passel of their very welcoming friends, watching "Once More With Feeling" and listening to them sing along in preparation for the performance they're off to later tonight. I've only seen it once before, so I didn't really manage to sing with them (alas! They were lovely harmonizers, too!) but I did have a ton of fun.

And there were no trips to the ER by either Aspen and her guests or my family, so I think the trip can be counted a success.

Tomorrow we head out for Solina, KA, and the day after to Oklahoma City. And my computer still doesn't work. *resigned* I won't be entirely incommunicado for the next while, because Mom is kind enough to let me use hers when I need to, but still. No AIM and probably not much threading for a bit.

Oh, well. The evening more than made up for the computer frustration. :) Not to mention getting to Tattered Cover!

Last night, there was a lovely dinner of gnocchi and caprese and homemade mint ice cream, followed by setting off fireworks, followed by a thunderstorm.

I didn't sleep so well, unfortunately, due to a combination of my room being way too hot, and my asthma starting to act up (is this an elevation thing, maybe? There's also the two cats in the house, but generally they just make me sneeze, not wheeze). And I had some bizarre dream involving the UAA Arts building and my director from this summer. And possibly Lady Sally. The former I blame in part on rewatching Slings & Arrows; the latter . . . you got me.

Lord, I have so little to report. I keep composing entries in my head, about the grandeur of the scenery we're passing, or about traveling, whatever, and then I can never remember them when I sit down to write.

We're in Evergreen, CO, staying at the house of one of my mom's old college buds. They sell fancy French knives. :D Cool people, all told, and nice enough to take us to their office after hours so we can use their Internet here.

They also have a very sweet, very soft, very gray kitten by the name of Trillby.

Ugh. I am sleepy, man. I was up really late last night, and didn't get as much sleep on the road as I would've liked.